A Pie In Every Eye

A. W. Ellison, A. K. A. Billius, was a Chef. This is the story of The Chefs...Campus Pie Assassins, as they pied professors during lectures in humungous lecture halls at Michigan State University from 1979 to 1981. The story covers how The Chefs ca...

11 The Visit from the DPS

Leisure suits look bad on everyone. They looked twice as bad on the DPS officers that showed up on Les, Mick and Marcus' floor the next day. The DPS approached Les’ open doorway as he was looking into the mirror of the dresser next to his door while splashing on some after-shave. The tall, stern looking officer was the one who spoke.

“We’re looking for a Mr. Lester O’Malley”, he barked.

Les turned and felt that the jig was up. He politely stated;

“Yes, officer, that’s me.” The other officer, the silent one, handed the tall one a black leather folder which held several 8”x10” black and white glossy photographs with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explainin' what each one was, to be used as evidence against us. Les was handed the pictures and his heart sank.

“The photos were made from the videotape of Professor John Butler’s accounting class which was held in B102 Wells Hall yesterday afternoon. As you can see, two assailants dressed as Chefs are confronting Professor Butler with an umbrella and two pies, undoubtedly with intent to do bodily damage to said professor “, the tall officer explained.

Mick and Marcus came out of their dorm rooms and joined Les, checking out the photographs. The photos showed each Chef with their pies. Les, as Carbohydrate, was holding the umbrella. Mick, as Niacin, had a huge smirk on his face as he stood poised with his cream missile. The tall officer looked from the photo to Mick and stated to Les;

“I can see that at least one of your friends here was involved as well.”

"That’s obviously an imposter” was Mick’s reply. Les took a more serious tone of approach.

“What’s going to happen?” he asked, looking once more at himself as Carbohydrate, caught on film. Mick continued his sarcastic wit to soften the tension that he could tell Les was feeling.

“Can we have these wallet size?”

“You certainly may not. They will be used as evidence against you if the professor decides to press charges.”

The tall officer had no sense of humor. He also needed to be pied. That's what we were trying to be about, anyway. That's what made our pie throwing seem righteous. We were becoming tricksters using trickster activism where, through humor, we were trying to make serious points to wake people up about political and social problems. In our case the problems were the self-righteousness of the professors who felt superior because of the pieces of paper that are framed on their walls. Most of whom don't seem to have the time to take from reflecting on their self important dissertations to stop and look around themselves for a moment to tend to the student's real educational needs. The need for learning directly from the professor, the need to be able to ask the professor a question, to be able to engage the professor in a discussion on the subject of the class. Hell, some of the professors don't even show up for class. They type up their notes and relay them to their T.A. for that term to relay them to the class. That's not teaching, that's a relay race. The professors needed to be educated once again. That was where the Chefs came in. We were practicing the art of the trickster. The clown amuses us but the trickster is trying to teach us something about what it means to be human. The trickster is a rebel who loves to make fun of people who have lost their sense of humor and balance and who think they are more important than they really are. We always need tricksters.

“What if the professor doesn’t press charges?” Marcus asked, making a valid point.

“Then there’s nothing that we can do.” The tall officer said, stating the facts. “It’s up to the professor. We’re just here to show you the proof of your actions and we recommend that you turn yourselves in. We suggest that you think carefully about this. Your decision could affect the rest of your lives. Good day, gentlemen”, he said as he turned and marched back down the hall, followed by his backup butt-boy.